Frequently Asked Questionson the RP Photonics Buyer's Guide

Why Use a Buyer's Guide – Don't People Use Google Nowadays?

Yes, they often do.
However, it would be wrong to conclude that a enhanced listing in the best buyer's guide is not needed.

Because of our excellent search engine ranking (better than for any other photonics buyer's guide), Google searches bring many people to our photonics encyclopedia or directly to our buyer's guide pages (e.g. to listings of suppliers), rather than to the website of a particular supplier.
Therefore, it is essential to be found in our buyer's guide.

By the way, general Internet search engines are not a good replacement for a high-quality buyer's guide.
They deliver a lot of search results which are not relevant (= indicating a potential supplier) and miss others.
For quickly getting a reliable overview on available suppliers, you need to use a high-quality buyer's guide like ours.

Also noted that people will see the information from our advertisers when reading encyclopedia articles; that's important branding.

Isn't It Enough to Advertise with Photonics.com, Laser Focus World and optics.org?

That would be enough if most users were using their buyer's guides.
But apparently they aren't!
Some of our advertisers reported that they receive much more traffic from RP Photonics (rp-photonics.com) than from any other domain – and we never hear the opposite.
That is consistent with the answer to the following question:

that you get more traffic from us to your website (check your server statistics!)

Can I Trust Buyer's Guides?

As a user, you generally can trust at least for the common buyer's guides e.g. that they won't suppress listings of important suppliers.
Well, they may present companies for a product which don't really offer that, but such poor data quality is just a nuisance, not a risk.
The risk of overlooking important suppliers is much greater if you rely on Internet searches.

As an advertiser, you should be very careful.
For example, many published traffic statistics for websites are highly misleading, and some are even completely wrong – essentially always presenting too high numbers, by the way!
Our recommendations:

Treat all published traffic data with great care.
Ask what exactly they apply to (e.g. the buyer's guide or the whole website, also containing thousands of articles which are irrelevant for your purposes?).
Check their plausibility by investigating the search engine ranking (at least with a quick search for some important keywords).

Check yourself what is most relevant for you: the incoming traffic on your web server.
You should at least study statistics on how many visits you obtain from different web domains.
If possible, compare that with what they claim and draw your own conclusions.

Why Should I Sell More When Having the Ad Package?

If it were not more than just some bold letters and your logo, you should indeed be skeptical.
However, our ad package gives you far more than just some “hello-look-here” effect.
The main point is easily understood:

Readers tend to scan only websites which appear particularly promising.

Imagine a product where we have 50 suppliers, five of which display their product description based on the ad package.
If a reader finds something suitable there, he or she is unlikely to check the website of the other 45 suppliers to find out what they offer.
So the point is: Show in our resource what you offer in order to capture their interest, because otherwise people may not visit your website.

Besides, with the ad package your information will even appear in related encyclopedia articles – that greatly supports your brand!

In addition, you profit from features like the strongly enhanced company profile, social media links, display of upcoming exhibitions, a prominent display in the alphabetical list of suppliers, one included banner and a special promotion etc.

How Can I Get Started?

If your company is listed already, please click on the entry of your company in the list of suppliers in order to get to your profile.
At the top right corner of the profile page, you find the button “Edit Profile”, which brings you to a form for submitting modified entry details.
That form already contains the details registered so far; you can just add what is missing.

Our form for submitting your company data (see above) is easy to use.
It contains a list of the many products which can be registered.
Indicating that your company offers a certain product takes just one click.
If you have an ad package, you can then enter a product description, or just the URL of a page on your website on which we can find your product description and image.

Will the Entries Be Active and Legally Binding When I Submit the Data?

If you submit your data with the form, they will first be reviewed by RP Photonics.
If any ad package is ordered, you will obtain an e-mail with the details from us.
Only when you confirm your consent with those, the enhanced entries will be displayed.

By the way, we also don't automatically prolong your entries; we always ask for your consent.

Can I Change the Entries Later On?

Yes, you are welcome to update your address data, product information etc. at any time; we will do the corresponding changes on the website without additional cost, assuming that you do not request such changes many times per year.

You can even upgrade your enhancements at any time; we will make an offer if you tell us what you need.

We do our best to be very flexible and provide you with an excellent service.